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Springtime makes me restless. While I impatiently wait for the sun to makes its grand appearance, I defy the gray skies through eating and eating schemes. I have the same conversations with myself about the next diet I could try. Making anything off-limits will trigger my disordered eating habits. VS I should give up sugar 100% again. It was really cool when I did that that one time… My ongoing ability to create cognitive dissonance after repeating the same patterns multiple times never ceases to amaze me. I am a normal eater now. Of course we can keep unlimited sweets in the house! I never learn. The ultimate problem boils down to 1 inevitable conclusion I come to again and again: Well, I’m bored and life is meaningless anyway.

I’m not trying to be melodramatic. I honestly believe that life is what you make it and nothing more. Some people may actually find this inspiring. At the end of the day, I do not have an ultimate purpose to grasp hold of, and sometimes for the life of me, I can’t think of a damn thing to do that would cure my boredom. What’s a girl to do? Distract herself with pastries of course…

Bum Bum Bum, Another One Bites the Dust…

You’ve probably gathered by now that I do not adhere to any religion. I am happy for those who find solace in their beliefs, but I’m actually comfortable with the concept of an afterlife consisting of nothing but dirt. I believe we create meaning while alive by enjoying/bettering ourselves, our planet, and/or the lives of those around us. I am not claiming that there couldn’t possibly be a God. I just get slim to nil fulfillment out of the idea that there is. You can’t pull faith out of thin air.

I am most content in life when I have so many interests keeping my attention that what’s on my plate is not the primary focal point of my day. Does this sound like dietitian blasphemy? Perhaps. Of course health matters, but it’s not everything. Now I’m really smiting the diet gods.

“How easily the wind overturns a frail tree. Seek happiness in the senses, indulge in food and sleep, and you too will be uprooted.” – Buddha

I use diets or the lack thereof as a distraction when nothing else sounds appealing. I enjoy both approaches in different ways. When I am eating anything and everything that sounds good, I can temporarily tuck away the guilt-ridden thoughts just long enough to get my brownie high. It’s short lived and intense. Sugar is my crack and food is my savior. Hallelujah! Sacred scripture is often ignored: “Eat Food. Not Too Much. Mostly Plants”. Bless me Michael Pollan, for I have sinned.

“And put a knife to your throat if you are given to appetite.” (Proverbs 23:2)

“O you who have believed, decreed upon you is fasting as it was decreed upon those before you that you may become righteous -” (Surat Al-Baqarah 2:183)

Intermingled with my sinfully joyful binges are periods of repent: fasting in various fashions. NO SUGAR! NO GRAINS! NO DAIRY! NO CAFFEINE! NO FUN! 😉 I am rewarded with compliments “I could never have that kind of willpower” and self-righteous thoughts I am so above those treats that everyone else is a slave to. My higher power is dictated by a society that has created meaning out the meaningless. As if the ability to retain a thin figure or resist a sugar cookie suggests you’ve passed the ultimate test, rather than finding just another way to kill time.

“Eating disorders, on any level, are a crutch…a way of avoiding the banal, daily, itchy pain of life. Eating disorders provide a little drama, they feed into the desire for constant excitement…And they are distracting. You don’t have to think about any of the nasty minutiae of the real world, you don’t get caught up in that awful boring thing called regular life…”- Marya Hornbacher, Wasted: A Memoir of Anorexia and Bulimia